122 DEATH OF THE PAPOOSE. 



a complaint that much resembled cholera, endured 

 the most terrible griping pains, during the paroxysms 

 of which his little body was almost doubled in two, 

 while every writhe of his tortured frame brought the 

 large crystal tears into his mother's eyes. It was 

 evident that the disease had got such possession 

 of the poor child that only a powerful medicine 

 could give relief. I therefore searched the trunk 

 that bore the name of medicine-chest, and found 

 some essence of ginger, which with four or five drops 

 of laudanum, diluted with water, I administered, 

 applying at the same time a mustard poultice to the 

 sufferer's stomach. The poor woman, with the most 

 perfect confidence in my good intentions, sat by, 

 watching with anxious eye all I did. For half-an- 

 hour I thought I should succeed in effecting a cure, 

 but a fresh paroxysm, far more severe than those that 

 had preceded, took place, and from that moment the 

 little sufferer gradually sunk, his spirit going so 

 slowly and peacefully to the source from whence it 

 was derived, that I was ignorant of the moment when 

 it had departed. When the poor mother became 

 aware that her child was dead, a loud wail of anguish 

 burst from her lips ; but when I told her that all 

 was for the best, that her progeny had gone to the 

 great hunting-ground, where he would be ever happy, 

 where he would be ready to welcome her, with an 

 effort almost super-human she controlled herself, and 

 relapsed into a moody silence, still pressing closer to 

 her breast the inanimate form of her darling papoose. 



